If you add up sales of the Prius Liftback (aka, the regular Prius), the C, V and Plug-In models, you get 46,380 units for the first three quarters of 2012, according to numbers from the California New Car Dealers Association and reported by Bloomberg. That's enough to move the Prius from fourth place last year to first this year in the sales rankings in America's most populous state. In fact, roughly a quarter of the Priuses that Toyota sold in the US were in California. Reports of $5 gallons of gas are relatively recent, but we have to assume that the state's long-time high gas prices are playing a role in pushing the Prius to the pinnacle there. Nationwide, Bloomberg says, the Prius is in seventh place ("by sales volume among car models").

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fefifofum...I bought the Camry over the Ford because I still don't trust Ford. I've owned 3 Fords and when things went wrong...they weren't willing to set things right. Also, I'm having NO issue getting 50 MPG out of my Camry Hybrid. My other Toyota product has 150k MILES and ZERO ISSUES. You're the sheeple. I'm the one making the most sound investment possible.

California is like a the "third world" country...poor uneducated people with subcontinental taste in cars.Only a huge devastating earthquake can complete this dismal, unfortunate image of a decrepit place like California.

let's not mention that California is the home of Stanford and the University of California (Berkeley, UCLA, UCI) system. let's also not mention that California is the number 1 economy in all of the United States.

California now ranks as the 50th most educated state, ranking below all states...even below Mississippi. It is getting closer to third world...the handful of rich communities in each major metro area, and tons of undesirable zones that used to be middle class, but the middle class is leaving by the millions, leaving only the very poor and very rich left.

Yeah, that is so true. Nothing cave-men living here in Califorinia. But it is weird, with only sticks, stones, and an abacus to work with, California manages to be the home of Apple, Google, Intel, eBay, Cisco, Facebook, Yahoo!, Oracle, etc.

You may dislike California, but many social and technological trends start there and eventually filter to the rest of the USA. Think of emissions controls in cars, restrictions on smoking in public places, environmental consciousness (think of John Muir a century ago!), and more.

No surprise to me. I live in San Diego where hybrids do well (batteries do better in moderate climates it seems). But there also seems to be a lot of Nissan Leafs and Altima Hybrids, Ford Escape/Fusion Hybrids, Lincoln MKZ Hybrids, etc. I saw a new C-Max.